An ultrasound (US) imaging system generally includes a console with a connector(s) configured to receive a complementary connector of an ultrasound probe having a transducer array. The transducer array has been used to transmit ultrasound signals and acquire ultrasound echoes corresponding to a plane (e.g., axial) of an organ(s) and/or structure(s) (e.g., a biopsy needle) in the body. In B-mode imaging, the echoes have been processed to generate scanlines, which have been used to generate a scanplane (or 2D image of the plane), which can be visually presented via a display.
In order to additionally view a plane in another orientation (e.g., sagittal), the user has to move the probe to the other orientation and perform a scan at the other orientation. In response to moving the probe and scanning in the other orientation, the displayed image in the first orientation is replaced by another image from the other orientation. In order to concurrently utilize the images from both orientations, the clinician has to make a mental image of the first image (i.e., memorize it) and then mentally construct an image based on the mental image and the displayed second image.
Another approach includes using a second probe connected to a second connector of the console. Unfortunately, ultrasound consoles only scan on one connector at a time. As such, images of different planes are acquired at different times and have to be mentally combined to construct an image. Another approach includes using a biplane probe, which is a probe that includes two arrays angularly arranged with respect to each other to acquire data from different planes (e.g., axial and sagittal planes). With a biplane probe, either both arrays have a reduced set of elements such that the total number of elements is the same as a single array probe or a multiplexer is used to alternately operate the arrays.